All-round Mid Laner

Chapter 75

By the time Ye Shaoyang and Chi Shuo finalized contract negotiations with their streaming platform and returned to Tianhuan's base, it was already December 15th.

The battle between the Top 8 of the world championships was set to begin.

On the 16th, Jingzhe would face off against Team ATB of the Korean division. Team ATB were the champions of the Korean division that year, and they hadn't lost a single game in the entire group stage of the world championships—they won their way straight through to the Top 8. In the eyes of the world, they were the strongest contender for the world championship throne.

On the 17th, Binghun would play against Team FLD from the North American division. Team FLD were the defending champions who'd won the world championship title last year. They were overall the most powerful team from the North American division.

Neither Jingzhe nor Binghun seemed to have very bright futures ahead of them.

When domestic fans saw the tournament schedule, dark clouds enveloped their heads. Some fans didn't even dare watch the matches, deathly afraid that their favorite team would lose to a foreign team.

The year's world championships were being held in Paris, which had a seven hour time difference with China.

In Paris, it was 19:00 at night on December 16th. In China, it was already two in the morning.

The match between Jingzhe and ATB was set to begin. Coach Lin gathered all of Tianhuan's players in a meeting room to watch the game on a big screen.

Qin Yizhu very generously shared his own snacks with everyone—packets of walnuts, peanuts, sunflower seeds, and all sorts of cookies and potato chips littered the conference table. Ye Shaoyang had also brought Xiao Bai with him. Everyone watched the game while playing with the cat.

In the round where the Top 8 of the world championships would be cut down to the Top 4, matches were Best-of-5 and played with the cumulative picks and bans structure.

After the first two games, Jingzhe and ATB were at 1-1.

In the third game, ATB relied on a strange new team comp to achieve victory. In the fourth game, Jingzhe struggled and fought to even out the score once more.

And in the final, deciding game, Jingzhe won a certain degree of superiority in early-game. Fang Zhengqing moved down to the bottom lane and worked with Xie Yuan to instakill ATB's marksman. However, in the middle stages of the game, ATB started to endlessly avoid fights and rely on micro-play to snowball an advantage for themselves. From beginning to end, the two teams stayed neck and neck in terms of resources.

In a critical team fight, ATB's jungler found an opportunity to circle to the back of Jingzhe's lineup and instakill the marksman Xie Yuan. From there, ATB pushed down the bottom lane and bulldozed their way to Jingzhe's base.

Jingzhe defended their base for five minutes, but the incoming swarms of minions were too much. Although Fang Zhengqing and Xie Yuan worked together to fend off three waves of ATB's attack, in the end—ATB still managed to push their way into Jingzhe's base with the buff from the grand dragon.

Jingzhe helplessly lost the match.

As the base crystal exploded, everyone in Tianhuan's conference room sank into a brief silence.

A moment later, Coach Lin sighed and muttered, “The Korean division's micro-play tactics are too powerful. Jingzhe lost very tragically in this last game. They had a bit of an advantage early on. It's just too bad they didn't swiftly end the game earlier.”